Range Planning for Fashion: A Practical Guide (2026)

You know how many styles you want to make. What you have not decided is how wide to go and how deep to commit. That decision is range planning, and it is where cash gets won or lost long before a single garment is sold. Go too wide and you tie money up in fringe options nobody buys. Go too narrow and you sell out of the winners and leave money on the table.

Range planning is not the same as designing a collection. It is the math that decides how many options to carry and how many units to put behind each. This guide covers what a range plan is, how it differs from a line plan and an assortment plan, the width and depth trade-off, the steps to build one, the mistakes that quietly drain margin, and how to keep the whole thing connected to the product.

Table of Contents

• TL;DR: Range planning in five lines
• What is range planning in fashion?
• Range plan vs line plan vs assortment plan
• Width vs depth: the core trade-off
• What goes in a range plan
• Why brands get range planning wrong
• The 7 steps to build a range plan
  • Step 1: Set the budget and the calendar
  • Step 2: Decide the category architecture
  • Step 3: Set width: how many options
  • Step 4: Set depth: units per option
  • Step 5: Balance core, carryover, and newness
  • Step 6: Map the price and color story
  • Step 7: Pressure-test against margin and sell-through
• The metrics that make a range plan readable
• What a range plan should not decide for you
• Range planning: the old way vs a connected way
• Common range planning mistakes and how to avoid them
• What to look for in a range planning tool
• How range planning affects your margin and cash
• How Kampana handles range plan review
• FAQ
• The bottom line

TL;DR: Range planning in five lines

• Range planning decides how many options a collection carries and how many units to commit to each, inside a budget, before design is locked (Solvoyo).
• The core tension is width vs depth. Push width and depth thins out. Push depth and the range narrows. You cannot maximize both (Davinci Retail).
• For most brands, range plan and line plan are the same document under two names. Range plan is the term used widely outside the US (Solvoyo).
• Concentrate units in proven options and test new ones at shallow depth. Capping experiments protects cash and lets sell-through guide the next buy (Shopify).
• A range plan is a budget decision, not a creative one. Map yours to Kampana's line plan review workflow to keep width, depth, and margin honest before you commit to production.

What is range planning in fashion?

Range planning is the process of deciding which options a brand will carry for a season and in what depth. It is the bridge between customer demand, brand vision, and the commercial target. The range plan maps the option counts of a new collection by attributes like category, price band, color group, and end use (Solvoyo).

In plain terms, range planning turns a creative idea into a countable, costable buy. It answers two questions at once: how many distinct options do we offer, and how many units do we put behind each. Both are money questions, and both get decided before sampling.

The range plan sits between concept and the buy. Concept gives direction. The range plan turns that direction into a structured set of options with units attached, so the buy is a plan and not a guess. For the work that feeds it, see how to turn brand DNA into a collection concept.

Think of it as the shape of the season. The range plan is where you decide whether to go wide and shallow, narrow and deep, or somewhere in between. That shape drives your cash, your margin, and your markdown risk.

Range plan vs line plan vs assortment plan

These three terms get used interchangeably, and the confusion costs brands money. Here is the clean distinction.

A range plan, for most brands, is the same artifact as a line plan: the roadmap of the collection's options by category, price, and delivery, set before design is locked. Range plan is simply the term used widely outside the US for the same document (Solvoyo). A line plan defines the products that will become the collection.

An assortment plan comes next. It decides how those options are distributed across channels, stores, and time. The range or line plan defines what to make. The assortment plan decides where it goes (Centric Software).

Document	Core question	When	Owner
Range plan (line plan)	How many options, how deep, at what price and date?	First, before design	Merchandising / founder
Assortment plan	Which options go to which channel, store, or window?	After the range plan	Buying / planning
Open-to-buy plan	How much money can we spend?	Feeds the range plan	Finance / merchandising

The order matters. Set the budget, build the range plan inside it, then plan the assortment from the locked options. For the depth-versus-width detail at the assortment stage, see our guide on assortment planning for small fashion brands, and for the line plan basics, see what a fashion line plan is and how to build one.

Width vs depth: the core trade-off

The central decision in range planning is how to split a fixed budget between width and depth. They pull against each other.

Width, or breadth, is how many options you carry: styles, categories, colorways, variations. Depth is how much you commit to each: units per option, per size. You do not get to maximize both. Push breadth and depth thins out. Push depth and the assortment narrows (Davinci Retail).

Getting the ratio wrong is expensive in both directions. Miss it toward width and you tie cash in fringe colors and one-off styles instead of investing in proven winners. Miss it toward depth and you sell out of the few options you carried and leave demand on the table (Style Arcade).

The practical rule for small brands is to concentrate depth in a core of proven options and test newness at shallow depth. Put the majority of your units behind a small number of core options, then spread a thin layer of units across a few new bets. Let live sell-through tell you which experiments to back next season (Shopify).

What goes in a range plan

A useful range plan has one row per option and a fixed set of columns. Thinner than this and you cannot make decisions. Fatter and nobody keeps it current.

Column	What it captures	Example
Option ID	Unique ID per style-color	TOP-024-OAT
Style	Human label	Linen Camp Shirt
Category	The slot it fills	Warm-weather woven top
Role	Its job in the range	Core
Price band	Where it sits on the ladder	Mid ($120)
Target cost	Landed cost at target margin	$44
Units (depth)	How many to buy	600
Delivery	When it ships to channel	Delivery 1, March
Status	Where it is in development	Tech pack in progress

The key column that separates a range plan from a basic line plan is depth: the unit count behind each option. That number is the buy. Consistent planning metrics to track alongside it include buy units, buy at cost, buy at retail, intake margin percent, and average depth per option (Style Arcade).

Count options honestly. An option is a distinct style-color combination. Ten styles in three colors each is thirty options, and buyers and factories count options, not styles (Bamboo Rose). Your range plan should count the same way they do.

Why brands get range planning wrong

Most small brands plan width by instinct and depth by whatever is left in the budget. The result is a range that is too wide, too shallow, and quietly bleeding cash.

Here is what bad range planning looks like in practice:

• You add options because each one is exciting, spreading the budget so thin that no option has the depth to matter.
• You buy equal depth across every option, treating an untested newness style like a proven core seller.
• You ignore the price ladder, clustering options at one price and leaving gaps where customers fall through.
• You set depth from optimism instead of sell-through, then markdown the surplus when demand does not show up.

None of these are creative problems. They are structure problems. Too high volumes lead to unnecessary markdowns, too low volumes lead to missed sales, and the range plan is where you set the balance (Style Arcade).

The industry cost of getting this wrong is real. Fashion's overproduction is valued at $70 to $140 billion a year, much of it cash committed to options and depth the market did not want (Business of Fashion). A disciplined range plan is the cheapest defense against joining that number.

The 7 steps to build a range plan

This is the practical build. Work top to bottom. Do not start by picking units per style.

Step 1: Set the budget and the calendar

Range planning starts with two ceilings: money and time. The open-to-buy is the dollar amount available for new inventory after current stock and existing orders. The formula is planned sales, plus planned markdowns, plus planned end-of-month inventory, minus planned beginning-of-month inventory (Shopify).

Then set the calendar. The fashion calendar runs about six months ahead of retail, so plan backward from delivery dates and lead times (FashionUnited). The budget caps total units. The calendar caps what can ship on time.

Step 2: Decide the category architecture

Before any specific option exists, decide how the range splits across categories and price bands. Say you need tops, bottoms, dresses, and one outerwear group, and decide roughly how much of the buy each category deserves.

This is the skeleton. Filling the architecture first stops you from over-investing in one category and starving another. It also frames the width decision that comes next.

Step 3: Set width: how many options

Now decide how many options to carry in each category. This is the breadth call. More options mean more choice for the customer and more cash spread across the range (Davinci Retail).

Resist the urge to go wide for its own sake. Each option you add pulls units away from the options you already believe in. Set width deliberately, category by category, against the budget.

Step 4: Set depth: units per option

Now assign units. Depth is not equal across options. Put the majority of your units behind core and proven options, and test newness at shallow depth (Style Arcade).

A useful starting shape is to concentrate most of your unit buy in a small number of core options, then spread a thin layer across experiments. The deep options carry the season. The shallow ones are cheap tests that tell you what to scale next time.

Step 5: Balance core, carryover, and newness

Tag each option with a role, the same way you would in a line plan: hero, core, carryover, or newness. The roles guide the depth. Carryover and core earn deep buys because they are proven. Newness earns shallow buys because it is a bet.

A range that is all newness at full depth is a season-sized gamble. Carryover at least one proven body and one fabric story to anchor the range (McKinsey). To rework a proven option for a new season, see how to refresh a carryover product.

Step 6: Map the price and color story

Lay every option on the price ladder and look for gaps and clusters. If options pile up at one price and nothing sits below it, you have no entry point. If the ladder skips the middle, customers fall through it.

Do the same for color. Plan a color story across the whole range, not option by option, so the collection photographs as a collection and merchandises cleanly. For the design side of that, see building a color story across a collection.

Step 7: Pressure-test against margin and sell-through

Before you lock, run three checks. Does the total buy fit the open-to-buy? Does the blended intake margin hit target? Does the planned sell-through look realistic given history (Shopify)? If any answer is no, adjust width or depth until all three are yes.

Then lock it. A locked range plan is the brief for the buy, sourcing, and the end-to-end collection launch. Changing it after this point should be a deliberate call, not a drift.

The metrics that make a range plan readable

A range plan you cannot read is just a list of units. These are the numbers that turn it into a decision tool.

Option count. The total number of distinct style-color options. This is what you are really buying and what factories quote against (Bamboo Rose).

Average depth. Total units divided by option count. A low average depth across many options is the classic too-wide, too-shallow warning sign (Style Arcade).

Intake margin. The blended margin across the range at target cost and planned retail. One thin-margin option is fine if core and carryover lift the blend.

Projected sell-through. The share of units you expect to sell at full price. Sell-through rate is units sold divided by units received, times 100, and a common target floor is around 80 percent (Shopify).

Metric	What it tells you	Watch for
Option count	Width of the range	Creep past your budget
Average depth	Width-depth balance	Too low across too many options
Intake margin	Whether the buy pays	One option dragging the blend
Projected sell-through	Demand realism	Optimism with no basis

What a range plan should not decide for you

A range plan is a structure, not a taste machine. It can tell you the width-depth balance is off or the ladder has a hole. It cannot tell you whether the dress is right for the brand.

The plan should never decide the final edit. It surfaces that you have too many shallow options and not enough depth in the core. The human decides which options to cut and which to back. It should not set depth from a formula alone, because a new option's potential is partly judgment. And it should not pick your winners for you. Data shows what sold. It cannot feel what the next thing should be.

Use the plan to make width, depth, and margin visible and the trade-offs explicit. Keep the final call with a person who owns the season. This is the same approach Kampana takes across every workflow: the tool does the structure and the QA, a human approves the decision.

Range planning: the old way vs a connected way

Most range plans live in a spreadsheet that drifts out of sync with the design files, the tech packs, and the sample tracker within a week. The cost is not the spreadsheet. It is the gap between the plan and everything downstream.

	Spreadsheet-only range plan	Connected range plan
Source of truth	One file, emailed around	One canvas, linked to designs and packs
Width-depth math	Re-keyed by hand	Built in, recalculates live
Updates	Manual, often stale	Status flows from the actual work
Design link	None, lives elsewhere	Each option links to its style and tech pack
Review	A meeting and a screen share	A shared view with approval gates
Who approves	Whoever has the file open	Human approval gate plus product-fidelity QA

The connected version is not about fancier software. It is about the plan and the product living in the same place, so a change to width or depth shows up against the real styles. That is what Kampana's line plan review workflow is for.

Common range planning mistakes and how to avoid them

Mistake 1: Too wide, too shallow

The classic error. You add options until the budget spreads so thin no option has the depth to sell through cleanly. Fix it by setting a deliberate width per category and concentrating depth in proven options (Davinci Retail).

Mistake 2: Equal depth across every option

Treating an untested newness style like a proven core seller wastes cash on the bets and starves the winners. Fix it by tying depth to role: deep on core and carryover, shallow on newness.

Mistake 3: Depth set by optimism

Buying deep on hope, not history, fills the markdown rack. Fix it by setting depth against past sell-through and capping experiments (Shopify).

Mistake 4: A broken price ladder

Options clustered at one price with gaps elsewhere lose customers at the edges. Fix it by laying every option on the ladder in step six and filling the gaps before you lock.

Mistake 5: A plan nobody updates

A range plan that goes stale the day after the meeting is worse than none, because people trust it. Fix it by keeping the plan connected to the actual work so status updates itself.

What to look for in a range planning tool

Most brands start in a spreadsheet, and that is fine for a first season. When you outgrow it, look for these things rather than a longer feature list:

• Built-in width and depth math, so option count, average depth, and intake margin update as you plan (Style Arcade).
• One source of truth the whole team works from, not a file that gets emailed and forked.
• A link from each option to the actual product: the design, the tech pack, the sample status.
• Sell-through history surfaced next to the depth decision, so the buy is grounded in evidence (Shopify).
• A review mode with approval gates, so locking the range is a real decision, not a vibe.

The point is not software for its own sake. It is closing the gap between the plan and the product, so the range you buy is the range you intended.

How range planning affects your margin and cash

A range plan is a cash document before it is a creative one. Every unit of depth is money committed to fabric, production, and warehousing months before any of it sells.

Get the width-depth balance right and your cash goes into options that sell through at full price. Get it wrong and your cash sits on a markdown rack, either as fringe options nobody wanted or as deep buys on styles that missed. With inventory excellence and margin protection at the top of the agenda for fashion executives, the buy decision is the lever that matters most (Business of Fashion).

This is also the bridge to product. Once the range is locked, the work is execution: design, tech packs, samples, PDP, sell-in. The cleaner the range plan, the cleaner that whole chain runs, all the way to the end-to-end launch.

How Kampana handles range plan review

A range plan only works if it stays connected to the product. Kampana is an AI product creation OS for fashion brands. It runs your collection on a node-based canvas, so the plan and the product live in the same place, with approval gates and product-fidelity QA at every step.

What you get

• A range plan review you can run on the canvas, with each option linked to its design and tech pack.
• Width and depth math, including option count, average depth, and intake margin, surfaced as you build instead of re-keyed across tabs.
• Sell-through history shown next to each depth decision, so the buy is grounded in evidence.
• Gaps and clusters in the price ladder and color story made visible before you lock.
• A human approval gate on the locked range, with a direct handoff into technical design and the end-to-end launch.

The old way vs Kampana

	Old way	With Kampana
Where the plan lives	A spreadsheet, separate from product	One canvas, linked to designs and packs
Width-depth math	Re-keyed by hand	Surfaced as you build
Keeping it current	Manual, goes stale fast	Status flows from the real work
Spotting imbalance	A meeting and a squint	Average depth and gaps flagged live
Who decides	Whoever has the file	Human approval plus product-fidelity QA

How it works

1. Drop your options on the canvas and sort them into the category architecture.
2. Set width per category, then assign depth by role.
3. Let the canvas surface option count, average depth, margin, and ladder gaps.
4. Review and approve the locked range, then hand it straight to production and launch.

Pricing is credit-based. You draw from one shared pool with no seats and no subscription, and credits never expire. There is a free starter pack to run your first review, and the line plan review workflow uses a modest credit range because it is structure and QA, not heavy rendering. See credit pricing for current ranges.

FAQ

What is range planning in fashion?

Range planning is deciding how many options a collection carries and how many units to commit to each, inside a budget, before design is locked. It maps the option counts of a new collection by category, price, and color (Solvoyo). It turns a creative idea into a countable, costable buy.

Is a range plan the same as a line plan?

For most brands, yes. Range plan is the term used widely outside the US for the same artifact a line plan describes: a roadmap of the collection's options by category, price, and delivery (Solvoyo). Both name the document that lists options before design is locked. See our guide to the fashion line plan.

What is the difference between width and depth?

Width, or breadth, is how many options you carry. Depth is how many units you commit to each option. You cannot maximize both on a fixed budget, so range planning is the act of balancing them (Davinci Retail).

How do I decide how deep to buy each option?

Tie depth to role and history. Buy deep on proven core and carryover options, and test newness at shallow depth. Set the numbers against past sell-through rather than optimism, and cap experiments to protect cash (Shopify).

What is the difference between range planning and assortment planning?

Range planning defines the options and their depth. Assortment planning decides how those options are distributed across channels, stores, and time (Centric Software). The range plan comes first. For the next step, read assortment planning for small fashion brands.

How many options should a range have?

There is no universal number. It is set by your open-to-buy budget and the depth you need per option, not by ambition. Decide the budget first, set width per category against it, then assign depth so the core options carry the season (Shopify).

Can AI build my range plan?

AI can structure the range, do the width-depth and margin math instantly, and surface where the plan is too wide or too shallow. It should not set final depth or pick winners on its own. Kampana keeps the math automated and the decisions behind a human approval gate, which is the right split for a buy this consequential.

The bottom line

Range planning is the buy decided before the buy. It sets how many options you carry and how deep you go on each, inside a budget you set first. It is the difference between cash that sells through at full price and cash that sits on a markdown rack.

The brands that get it right do not have better taste. They set the budget, decide width deliberately, concentrate depth in proven options, test newness shallow, and pressure-test against margin and sell-through before they lock. Width and depth are a trade-off, and range planning is where you make the trade on purpose.

Kampana keeps the range plan and the product in the same place, with width, depth, and margin surfaced and a human owning the call. Start with one range plan review and see the whole buy at once.

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og:title: Range Planning for Fashion: A Practical Guide (2026)
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